Soumya Vishwanathan murder case: The story so far

Soumya Vishwanathan murder case: Supreme Court issues notice in Soumya’s murder case, grants bail to convicted men, sparking controversy. Here’s the story so far

The Supreme Court on April 22 issued notice in a petition filed by Madhavi Vishwanathan, mother of murdered television journalist Soumya Vishwanathan, against the bail granted to four men convicted in the case. In February, the Delhi High Court granted bail to convicts — Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, Baljeet Malik and Ajay Kumar during the pendency of their appeals against their conviction and sentence in the case. The first three were also convicted in the 2009 Jigisha Ghosh murder case and are still in jail.

A Bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and Pankaj Mithal was initially reluctant to issue notice and instead asked Ms. Vishwanathan’s mother, Madhavi, to approach the High Court with a plea to expeditiously hear and decide the appeals. Justice Trivedi orally remarked that that the four men had served more than 14 years of their sentence.

However, advocate Malini Poduval appearing on behalf of the bereaved mother tried persuading the Bench by pointing out that the convicts would become a menace to society again on their release on bail. Ultimately, the Court granted the relief and listed the matter for hearing after four weeks.

In light of this development, here is a look back at the important events in the case.

Soumya Vishwanathan, a 25-year-old journalist at India Today — was found murdered at Vasant Vihar’s Nelson Mandela Road in what police claimed was a case of armed robbery in the early hours of September 30, 2008. According to court records, the local police station received a phone call about the killing around 3: 55 a.m. from a passer-by. Consequently, a Police Control Room team reached the spot and found a damaged Maruti Zen car lying near the central verge of the road. There were skid marks suggesting that the vehicle had dragged for some distance before ramming into the central verge and coming to a halt. The headlights were on and the right front tyre had burst.

A First Information Report (FIR) was registered on the same day and booked unknown persons for the offence of murder (Section 302 of the IPC). However, the breakthrough in the case came only a year later during the investigation of the murder of IT professional Jigisha Ghosh who was abducted from Vasant Vihar. Her body was recovered from Faridabad on March 21, 2009.

On March 23, 2009, the police arrested Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, and Baljeet Malik in connection with Ghosh’s murder. It was during questioning that the three men allegedly confessed that they were also involved in Vishwanathan’s murder. Later, the police arrested two other accused — Ajay Kumar and Ajay Sethi — in connection with the case.